Blogger teams with brewers to raise funds for fellow vets
A local Marine Corps veteran turned traveling craft beer blogger is helping American warriors in need one pint at a time.
Dave Pappas, a Newton native who now lives in Harvard, launched the Black Ale Project last year ( blackaleproject. org). The premise is simple: Pappas teams with breweries to make a unique one-off beer, the proceeds of which are then donated to a veterans charity of the brewers’ choice.
The Black Ale Project’s latest beer, dubbed Colors and brewed with Barrel House Z in Weymouth, debuted last night. It’s an amber lager aged in tequila barrels that’s being sold in the Barrel House Z taproom. Proceeds will benefit Home Base, a program run by the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital to promote the mental health of post-9/ 11 veterans.
“I’m just one guy who loves beer and was looking for a way to help veterans in need,” said Pappas, who joined the Marine Corps after graduating from Newton North High School in 1988.
The Black Ale Project launched last September, after Pappas contacted Medusa Brewing Co. in Hudson. It was an instant success, with more than $7,000 raised for the New England Center and Home for Veterans in downtown Boston.
He’s now brewed about a dozen beers around New England, with the likes of Wormtown Brewery of Worcester, Castle Island Brewing of Norwood and Prohibition Pig in Waterbury, Vt. True West Brewery of Acton released its Black Ale Project brew in late April and it’s still pouring today at the tavern.
Pappas now has plans to take his project national. He just announced yesterday that he’ll make a Black Ale Project beer with craft beer industry leviathan Ballast Point of San Diego, which generated international headlines in 2015 when it was purchased by Constellation Brands for $1 billion.
“Ballast Point lends credibility to the Black Ale Project,” Pappas said. “Plus, they have a huge military presence out there and employ a lot of veterans.”
After his stint in the Marine Corps, the “noncombat Gulf War-era veteran” launched a successful executive recruiting business here in Greater Boston. His passion for local brew inspired him to launch his blog, beer-journal.com, which
chronicles his travels to breweries across New England on his beloved black BMW R1200R motorcycle. All the while, the plight of many fellow veterans haunted Pappas.
“The craft beer community always welcomed me in the door even if they didn’t know me,” Pappas said. “At the same time, I was growing frustrated by the news of our veterans. The 22 suicides a day, homelessness, poor medical care and all the other problems they suffer. I wondered what I could do to help. I had built up a network of breweries and just started knocking on some doors.”